Lasting Illusion
by Mara Sevvie
Summary: For almost a week after confronting the Volturi and returning home, Alice wondered obsessively if anyone would have lasting nightmarish illusions about the Volturi. As Edward nurses an annoyance over the months that follow, Alice's wondering finally turns to bleak understanding.


Disclaimer: I do not own _The Twilight Saga_, it belongs to Stephenie Meyer and Summit Entertainment, etc. Nor do I gain any profit from this writing.

A/N: This is a one shot that randomly entered my mind when I was thinking about Edward in _Breaking Dawn_. Be forewarned, the theme may be a bit disturbing.

**Lasting Illusion**

* * *

For almost a week after confronting the Volturi and returning home to my family, I wondered obsessively if anyone would have lasting nightmarish illusions or fears about the power-hungry Italian coven. Certainly I started to. Not of them, in particular, but more the idea that I might very well have been left with no family at all, save for Jasper, Renesmee and Jacob. Sure, I could survive with only Jasper in my life; he was everything to me. Nessie would be a beautiful little girl to care for and Jacob could be tolerated if he truly cared for my niece. But grief would linger for ages and ages over the family who had been destroyed to ensure our survival.

The first month was torture, half aware of my current life and half searching frantically for the Volturi to decide that they wanted some of our powers too much to keep their word. My husband and closest brother both sat with me in those moments when the obsessive fear grew to overwhelming proportions. With Jasper on my left and Edward on my right, two pillars of strength whenever I lacked my own, the fears lessened. The first month ended, the fears faded entirely, and in their place the wondering began anew over my family's lasting reactions to the confrontation. Now that I began to truly focus on my family once more, I noticed Edward most of all as he nursed a tiny frustration.

It was only a simple annoyance. Such a small, unnoticed sort of annoyance that it bore almost no relevance to anything, excepting Edward's lack of patience. Just the hairs on the back of his neck feeling slightly out of place, that was all. Edward required constant rearrangement of the irritant, to be sure, but no more than that. Obviously everyone laughed at his consistently persnickety behavior about the feeling. After all, it was only a byproduct of his normal know-it-all, perfectionist behavior. Why not laugh? Better than criticism, as Rose used to do over such things.

A few weeks later, the simple annoyance grew into an itch that Edward couldn't scratch. He began not only rearranging the hair on his neck, but refusing to let even Bella or Esme touch the back of his neck, for fear it would become more out of place. Bella wondered if he shouldn't trim the hair for good, if it bothered him so much. Edward declined, of course.

"It's just a habit, love," he had told her indulgently, turning mischievous a moment later. "I run my hands through my hair all the time and you never want _that _cut."

Bella laughed at that and immediately stopped mentioning a trim. Not that it stopped Edward from being annoyed with the feeling. It even became difficult to hug him properly without being swatted away from his neck absentmindedly.

A month and a half passed and still the irritation persisted, growing into a very large agitation that caused Edward to snip at others occasionally, in addition to swatting away contact near his neck and shoulders. Jasper became frustrated with him whenever it happened, yet he didn't confront our brother. I called Jasper on it one day after a particularly heated moment between them and was surprised by his answer.

"Darlin' I know he's not doin' it on purpose," Jazz sighed that night. "He just needs to get the stress out of his system after all we went through with Bella, Nessie, the wolves, and the Volturi. With my gift, it can be challengin' not to reciprocate, but I don't want to snap back at him for somethin' that's perfectly normal."

I wondered how long it would take everyone to admit that Edward's slight rearranging and itching had turned into a literal scratching of his neck and throat. When he thought no one was looking, he had taken to pressing his head between his hands as though it were agonizing to think. At times, Edward even dragged his fingers down over his neck like he wished to tear it apart, but had no strength or will to do so. This was most certainly not normal at all.

A month. Another full month was what it took for Bella to admit her husband was obsessed. It was not, as Jasper claimed, normal.

"I think something's wrong with Edward," she worriedly confided in Rosalie and I one night, while the boys were out hunting as a group, Carlisle was at work, and Esme spent quality time with Nessie out on the town.

"What do you mean?" I asked calmly, certain that I knew where she was leading the conversation. Rosalie looked tentative about continuing. A general consensus of ignorance seemed to have been reached in the family in regards to Edward's behavior.

"This thing he has with the back of his neck…" Bella hesitantly started, then resolutely plowed onward, "I think it's more than simple irritation. Something about his neck is bringing back bad memories or something. I don't understand why, but it's driving him crazy. I can't even touch his neck or his shoulders anymore. That's on a good day. On worse days, I barely touch his back and he freaks out."

"How do you mean?" Rose asked concernedly, now giving in to the discussion as worry for our brother took precedence.

"I'll brush past him in the hall or the bedroom," Bella went on, clearly having been in want of this freedom to speak for some time, "and he jumps a mile, whips around in a mild panic, and asks me what I think I'm doing. I try to explain, but I can tell he isn't convinced. I'm his wife, for God's sake! I'm his mate! What's wrong with him?"

From her face, I knew there was more to it than that. "What else is going wrong, Bella?"

"We aren't— We haven't been..." Pausing, she took a deep breath and then forced out the next word, "intimate… for a while. He can't seem to make himself let go or let himself be touched. It's like when I brush his back accidentally. He just freaks out."

"He is… extremely emotional, too," Rose confessed heavily. Her eyes spoke of something she had been forbidden to tell, as we all could see.

"What is it, Rose?" Bella questioned grimly.

"What did you see?" I echoed with equal gravity.

Sighing deeply in resignation, Rose explained, "He begged me not to tell, and I swore on it, but I can't hide this anymore… Edward was supposed to go hunting with me a couple weeks ago, but when I went outside he was nowhere in sight. I was worried, naturally. After the Volturi left, I haven't felt completely safe about anyone being alone. So I started searching for him. I found him, but I almost wish I hadn't."

It was plainly difficult for her to continue – if her over-bright eyes were any indication – but she did so with an anxious sweep at her long blonde hair. "I've never seen Edward look that way before. He held his head between his forearms like it was under immense pressure, moaning and rocking back and forth on his knees, even whimpering occasionally. Through it all, his hands kept running back and forth over his neck, almost clawing at it."

Words did not appear adequate to describe the sight she had seen. Rose's eyes were desperately haunted as she spoke, and I knew she felt guilt for all the times she had labeled Edward as a cold and unfeeling creature.

"What's happening to him?" Bella repeated, breathy voice shaking with emotion. "Why won't he tell me?"

"He may not realize it," Rose offered equally as shakily, unshed tears brightening her sad gaze. I'd never seen her like that before. "Maybe the guys can help him."

It was impossible to agree, for I knew they wouldn't be helping him. Knew it because I saw it just then. They tried to help… tried to get out of Edward why he was so paranoid in his own skin. Jasper with brotherly comradeship and Emmett with his usual humor. Yet Edward was coming home at that very minute, evading Jasper and Emmett out of sheer panic. The look on his face was one I would never forget. It shook me to the core, forced a shiver down a spine.

Esme entered my visions then, too, smiling and holding Nessie's hand as they got out of the car and walked into the house just as Edward cleared the backyard.

Everyone but me shouted out fearfully when a strangled scream of anguish reached our ears, followed by a thunderous crash. I couldn't speak, couldn't react. I didn't bother to follow my mother and sisters to see what the commotion was. Edward's actions played out in my mind like some sick psychological thriller.

Emmett had paid no attention to Jasper's warnings to hold back; his worry was too great. My bear-like brother reached out to stop Edward, but the action was to his downfall. Edward was running on pure instinct, lashing out where there was only a perceived enemy and flitting haywire out of the grasping hands he saw. Sobs, though strongly repressed, escaped whenever Emmett was closest. Finally Edward could take no more of the dance, crying out his fears and throwing his own brother through the tree line and into an enormous cedar that stood no chance of surviving the impact. This was the crash we had heard.

Jasper took appropriate distance from Edward and tried with powerful emotions to reign in his younger brother's outbursts, but it was not to be. Turning tail from what he could tell was a far more experienced fighter, my near-twin leapt up into the open window to Carlisle's office. The resounding slam could be heard echoing in the trees around the house. Only I could see Edward curled up in the same manner Rose had described, rocking back and forth, head between his arms, hands clawing at his neck. But all of us could _hear_ him, alternately sobbing and whimpering like a small child.

When I forced myself back to the present, Bella was shaking violently in Esme's embrace and Nessie was crying in Rose's arms. Emmett, who knew better than to keep pursuing his brother, wrapped his enormous arms around all four of them, face grave. Jasper entered through the back door with such a look of urgency that I could have cried myself.

"We have to do somethin' now," Jasper demanded. No one could mistake the fear in his eyes, or the tiny hitch in his voice.

"Let me try and talk to him," Bella pleaded desperately. "Let me… Let me…"

Sobs left her throat raggedly, but she stood on her own feet and rushed up to the closed door of our father's office. My sister begged, cried, whispered, screamed, banged on the door… nothing worked. An hour passed this way, all of us trying our hand to bring back the man we knew, but we failed. Some terror beyond our control had taken hold of Edward. No one had any idea what it was. And to make matters worse, he did not even trust any of us.

The hour gave us some time to calm our own emotions, but barely, and in turn aided Jasper in thinking more rationally.

"We _must_ call," Jasper insisted gently to Bella where she sat despondently on the sofa. "Edward is actin' like a newborn vampire right now. The only one of us who has any experience in that arena with Edward specifically… is Carlisle. He should have some idea of what to do. At the very least, perhaps the familiarity of the situation will calm Edward enough to talk to him."

Bella nodded understandingly, unable to speak, and curled in on Nessie to hold her closer. The poor little thing had cried herself to sleep after her daddy failed to respond to her from within the office.

"And Bella?" Jasper added more gently, bringing her eyes to meet his. "It may be best to shield our minds from him for now. Can you do that?"

Nodding far more hesitantly, Bella closed her eyes and focused. Leaving her to her process, Jasper stood and called the hospital. We hardly listened to whatever Jasper told Carlisle on the phone. All I knew was that it was short, he explained the shield, and that immediately thereafter I saw my father claiming a family emergency and speeding home faster than he ever had before. Carlisle was there, tires squealing as he braked suddenly, and in the front door before anyone really recognized his arrival.

"Tell me," he demanded worriedly, to which I found myself abruptly explaining everything we had been noticing for the past three-and-a-half months, along with what had occurred that very day, up to the point that Edward evaded Jasper and leapt into the house.

"Where is he now?" Carlisle asked once I finished, face full of fear.

"Your office," Jasper murmured, passing as much calmness as he could gather onto Carlisle as the man disappeared upstairs.

Something seemed to draw us all upstairs behind our leader, Jasper at the front of the brigade. In rapt and hopeful silence we watched the scene unfold, praying that Edward would come back to us.

"Edward?" Carlisle called through the door, knocking twice briefly. A gut-wrenching sob broke out louder than the rest, making us all flinch. The fear in just that one sound was nearly insurmountable. Looking back at Bella for a brief moment, Carlisle seemed to make a snap decision.

"Bella, can you remove your shield from me alone?"

"I'll try," she whispered, closing her eyes for the second time that day to focus her shield. A difficult number of minutes later, Bella opened her eyes again, looking world-weary. "I did it."

Nodding, Carlisle tried again, "Edward."

Another knock, another sob, another flinch. Three more times Carlisle attempted to keep calm, and three more times Edward forced everyone's worry up a notch. Esme and Bella broke into quiet sobs again, heartbroken by the response yet not wishing to wake Nessie to such a scene. Rose had her face buried in Emmett's chest to hide her emotions. And Jasper and I? I wanted to hold him, to cry into his chest, to try and comfort his own anguish. But it was impossible. I knew that to hold him now would be to enhance the grief he already felt with my own, amidst the rest of the family's out of control feelings. No, I had to remain on my own, keeping a store of calm for my husband to rely on and spread into the atmosphere of the house as best he could. As much as I needed to break down and cry for my favorite brother – my best friend outside of Jasper and my twin in almost every sense of the word – I could not. I would not. Not until Edward was helped and Jasper was free of this emotional burden.

"Edward, please," Carlisle's voice finally broke on the word 'please' and did not regain its strength as he tried to speak further. "You know I would never hurt you. Please, just let me in."

No response forthcoming, Carlisle laid his forehead against the door in grief. How could we help Edward if he wouldn't let us in?

It was with stunned faces, then, that we all looked up as a click sounded from the office door. Carlisle snapped back in nervous shock, to find himself facing a sliver of open space.

"Edward?" he murmured as gently as possible, tentatively reaching his left hand out to the slightly open doorway. The door convulsively shut almost closed again, but slowly inched its way backward when Carlisle paused midway.

"Edward, it is going to be all right," he continued speaking softly, calmly, edging his hand forward at a snail's pace to reach his son. The door did not shut again, encouraging us all, and Carlisle's hand finally met the edge of the wooden barrier. Glowing golden eyes from inside the dark room took stock of the calm hand resting inches away, until something passed through those golden orbs that belied recognition and relief. Another hand made its way forward, this time out of the office, and grabbed the offered limb so quickly it as if there were someone watching who did not want him to. Carlisle willingly let himself be pulled through the doorway, barely squeezing through the opening he was given, and the door snapped shut behind him.

Tension arose, new and stiff, now that the view was obscured. Nessie had woken, Bella and Esme gripped each other like lifelines, Rose lifted her head from Emmett, and Jasper stood with militaristic poise in anticipation of anything going wrong. While my family relied on their sense of hearing and smell to determine the outcome, I pushed myself into the talent I relied on most, grateful that Bella was shielding Edward from seeing it.

Inside the room, Edward warily edged away from the door with Carlisle, before letting go suddenly of the hand he had grasped. The room was in pristine condition, but for the fact that Carlisle's chair had been pushed back haphazardly into the wall behind his desk. I got the feeling Edward had been hiding beneath the desk while he rocked and swayed with fear.

While any of us would have been uncertain how to handle an unpredictable and irrational Edward with no sense of familiarity for us, Carlisle moved with sure knowledge of how his son's mind worked. Sitting on the ground was his way of allowing Edward the high ground, tactically speaking. Carlisle's hands remained limp on the ground beside his hips, palm up – a sign of non-aggression to make Edward feel he had the advantage. And lastly, Carlisle's eyes never left Edward's for a moment. The honesty in his gaze would ensure Edward felt a small modicum of trust.

For the first time in all the years I had know him, I realized that Carlisle was likely as good at strategy as Jasper. He just didn't occasion its use in the same way. Violence was simply not in Carlisle's nature unless extremes were taken against his family that called for no other option.

"Edward," Carlisle greeted again, still soft and quiet.

To my shock, Edward responded in a normal voice, albeit a bit wary, "Carlisle."

Silence reigned momentarily, until… "What haunts you, Edward?"

Edward's hands twitched awkwardly to the back of his neck, a reminder of the instability lurking on the edge of his mind. "I… can't say. There's someone… something… I don't know!"

His last words were half shouted, panicky, afraid of some unseen threat and gearing up to bolt. The situation was escalating too quickly, a fact which Carlisle instantly noticed. "I am sorry, Edward. You need not talk about it, if it troubles you."

"It does," Edward curtly replied, still grinding his fingers against his skin.

"Very well," Carlisle accepted, nodding once. "Would you like to talk at all?"

"Maybe…" Edward seemed to consider it, but switched at the flick of whip, "No! No, I don't want to."

"As you wish," Carlisle accepted again, allowing a light meaningless smile to creep onto his face. Hesitating a mere moment, he added, "Do you mind if _I_ talk?"

"I… guess not," slowly Edward answered, cautious.

"You have not been so indecisive for a long while," Carlisle chuckled low, though there was still tension in his words. He knew this was not a pleasant conversation. "As a matter of fact, I believe it's been about seventy-five years since the last time."

I stumbled a little over this detail, wondering what he meant. Edward had been far more indecisive than just about any point in his life when he had met Bella, all the way until now. Why would Carlisle ignore that fact?

"More indecisive about Bella," Edward corrected quickly, causing the corner of my mouth to lift in a ghost of a smirk.

"Well, that was rather understandable, all things considered," Carlisle smiled wanly. "It was a difficult situation for all of us to work through."

Edward didn't respond. In fact, he did something even better. He sat on the floor facing our father and leaned forward conspiratorially.

"I'm… afraid," he admitted in the lowest of whispers. So low I doubted anyone but the three of us knew what he said.

"Of what?" wondered Carlisle with concern.

"He knows," Edward whispered with the same terror of earlier. "He'll see."

"Who, Edward? _Who_ sees everything?" Carlisle pushed urgently, but calmly, if that was even remotely possible.

Eyes shifty, hands grasping at his neck uncomprehendingly, Edward did not answer. Looking at him then, however, I noticed a distinct similarity to another paranoid vampire… Alistair. How did I miss it?

"Edward," Carlisle called his son, quietly pleading. "Edward, look at me."

Having no luck, Carlisle tried a tack he had somehow forgotten to use since entering the house.

"_Son_."

Edward snapped around so fast I jumped, but Carlisle took it in stride, lifting a hand to touch his son's face at last.

Without any fuss at all, Edward allowed the contact, though his eyes never left Carlisle's.

Taking greater strength from this allowance, our father tried a bit more, slowly passing his hand down and around the neck. The closer he got, the more anxious my brother became; nearly to a point of hyperventilation by the time Carlisle wrapped his hand around the back of Edward's neck. Fingers tightened, Edward trembled, but he never threw off the hand.

"This is about Aro," Carlisle spoke after the trembling subsided to a manageable level, bringing a gasp from everyone outside the room.

"He… he wouldn't let go," Edward shivered uncontrollably again, apparently unaware of the sounds elsewhere. "Watching everything I had in my mind, every thought about you and Bella and the rest of the family. When I see things, it's because I can't help it; because I can't turn it off. But him… it was like he enjoyed his invasiveness. Enjoyed analyzing my every memory like it was a book to be picked apart and critiqued. And I had to _watch_ it. At least no one else has to see him picking through their most personal memories piece by piece. Now he knows everything. Every insecurity, every weakness, every single thing or person he could use against me; everything I've ever seen in all of your minds, no matter how personal. And he knew what he was doing to me. He knew how it disturbed me, but he kept on… I felt so disgusting."

Soft, practically silent, crying overcame him, breaking all of our hearts into tiny shards. I knew what it felt like to have your every thought poured out to Aro; to feel violated in every sense of the word because you could not hide anything from him. Your body, your feelings, your inmost thoughts. Yet Edward was right. He had to see it all being processed through that monster's head. What kind of torture must that have been? Now, he could never forget it. It was stuck in his mind permanently.

"Son, I wish I could have taken that away from you," Carlisle painfully admitted, still grasping the back of Edward's neck as Aro had done over four months prior. This action, however, only offered comfort and stability in comparison with the mental rape Aro had instigated.

"The worst part was what he tried to make me see," Edward muttered terribly low, unable to look up at Carlisle again.

"What did he want you to see?" Carlisle inquired with eerie calm. Behind that calm was a storm brewing. If ever Aro tried to assault Edward like this again, I doubted Carlisle would let his old 'friend' live very long.

"Life with him and the others," whispered Edward. "He made it look like some sort of sick family. With himself as the father. He tried to make me see that he would be so much better of a fathering presence. He showed me his plans for the others, how few rules would constrain me, what he would let me have power over if I joined him… God, Carlisle, I feel ill remembering the way he glorified feeding from humans, pushing the scent and the taste and the feel of the blood into my head. Even pushing the gratification some vampires get before they drain their victim… I've never felt so sick and defiled."

For a moment I was drawn away from Edward and back to the hallway. This description of Aro's actions was more than Rose could bear to listen to. Knowing that her own brother had somehow been assaulted was just too much to take in. My sister's rare sobs shook her body as Emmett literally held her up in his arms where he stood. Esme and Bella had given up standing and pretty much collapsed on the floor, Nessie between them. It was actually Nessie who comforted her mother and grandmother, reminding me so much of Edward. And Jasper was in so much pain by now I was surprised he could still stand. Like Edward, he was trembling and his emotions had to be horrifyingly out of balance. My own were no better. How could I comfort him when I was out of control myself?

"I can tell you nothing to ease that pain," Carlisle whispered back to his first son. "I wish I could, but I cannot. I can only be here for you. As are the rest of our family."

"I know…" Edward tried to respond steadily in spite of hitching breaths. "I just… I keep feeling his hand at my neck. It's like he's still there, watching whenever I do anything. I can't even give all of myself to be with Bella… like that… anymore. I feel as though he can see it."

"He cannot see it, son," Carlisle assured him gently, sympathetically. "Aro is not here and he cannot see your most private moments anymore."

After a painful pause, Edward forced out his words in a choked voice, "I feel violated, Carlisle."

"Son, I am so sorry," Carlisle whispered in an equally emotional voice, reaching out to pull his firstborn into his arms. Edward accepted the embrace like someone drowning would reach out to a life preserver floating past them. Not many in our family had ever seen Edward this broken. Even his time without Bella was not so agonizing for me to watch.

Carlisle held my brother like a small child, Edward tucked up against his chest, under his chin, and wrapped in the secure arms of a father who knew no greater anger than to see his children maligned and no greater relief than to comfort his children in their distress. Time passed in mute grief while Edward soaked Carlisle's shirt with proverbial tears. No one moved, no one spoke, and even the crying had ceased in our effort to hear some progress from within.

At last, our wish was answered.

"Dad?" came the soft tone of Edward's voice, full of relief and confidence that had been sorely missing.

Carlisle's voice was equally gentle when he responded, "Yes, Son?"

For a minute, Edward was speechless, opening and closing his mouth to express some thought that he obviously felt very deeply. Yet the simplest words seemed to convey the greatest emotion he was experiencing.

"Thank you."

Closing his eyes, a tiny smile slipping onto his features, Carlisle only replied. "You are welcome."

Even when the two rose from the floor, normalcy slowly beginning to return to the atmosphere of our lives, the magic of the bond between father and son remained. It settled over us all like a blanket of hope as the two founders of our family exited the office – Carlisle's arm around Edward's shoulders – to find us all still in various positions of distress outside in the hallway.

To everyone's affectionate delight, Edward blanched for a long moment before a small smile grew into a blossoming grin.

"Thank you," he whispered again after a while, catching each of our gazes individually. When he settled on the last… on Rosalie… something broke in their relationship and was immediately sewn back together with far more strength and love than they had ever shared.

Holding back her further need to cry, Rosalie swept over to Edward and embraced him tightly. Our brother wrapped her up in his arms ever-so-gently, combing long fingers through her golden tresses as a means of comfort and reassurance. No one else, except for Emmett, had ever been allowed to do that.

"I'll be all right, Rose," he murmured to the top of her head, swaying slightly with her in his arms. "_We_ will be all right."

She only nodded her understanding, incapable of speaking yet, and reluctantly pulled away. More surprising than all of this was the brief kiss Rosalie pressed to Edward's cheek as she stepped back.

Esme started crying all over again at the changes being wrought in her children. Chuckling a little, Edward opened his arms to our mother, who threw herself into them without hesitation and nearly squeezed her son in half before she let go, whispering tightly, "I'm glad you're all right."

"So am I," Edward sighed, throwing a grateful look to Carlisle.

Tugging on his hand brought Edward to look down at his beautiful daughter, whose gaze was intelligent and compassionate as much as any adult's could ever be.

"I love you, Daddy," she softly told him, smiling sweetly and reaching up for him.

"I love you, too, sweetheart," Edward spoke low, grinning as he lifted her up to hold as close as possible without crushing her. Soon, though, she wiggled to get down and led her smiling father over to her mother.

Bella's lips trembled, but she held herself together well. "I wish I'd seen this sooner," she admitted guiltily, but Edward did not let her continue the self-deprecating thought.

"It wouldn't have helped, love," he confessed ashamedly. "The way I was feeling – the things I was imagining – only Carlisle could have cleared my mind of those things. It's not that I didn't trust you, either, before you say that."

Sheepishly, Bella ducked her head at the spot-on deduction.

"I love you and trust you with all I am," he told her sincerely, and that was enough for Bella. True to form, the once-chocolate-eyed girl threw herself at him to instigate a full and hearty kiss.

Emmett laughed with Nessie and Esme, lending more of the normalcy that we needed to the situation. Pulling away with – for once – not a drop of embarrassment, Bella smiled widely at her husband and pushed him towards a waiting Emmett, who gripped Edward with practically all he had in him before loosening his grip.

"I'm sorry I didn't listen to Jasper earlier," our burly brother admitted quietly, laughter gone. "I didn't mean to freak to you out."

"I'm glad you did, in a way," Edward suggested kindly. "If it hadn't gotten to such a breaking point, we might have danced around this for another month. Don't worry about it, all right?"

"Sure," Emmett grinned slightly, easily assured by the confidence in his brother's voice.

This now left Jasper and I to be embraced, though neither of us were ready for it. Jasper, I knew, was still reeling from the emotions he had felt from Edward and the rest of the family. He would need time to recuperate from the emotional backlash before engaging again.

As for me, I had yet to even allow the breakdown that had been waiting for me since Edward's fearful retreat into the office. I couldn't give into it yet – not with Jasper here to feel every terrible thing that I needed to rinse out of my system. I knew very well what my husband would feel like if I did so with him still in the vicinity. Desolate and moody, Jasper would turn inward and reflect on his negative history. That would be awful for all concerned.

"Jasper," Edward spoke, drawing a sudden look from my husband. "Not including you, Alice or myself, who is the calmest in the room?"

Focusing for a second, Jasper turned then to face our leader. "Carlisle is the calmest, even _with_ you and Alice and me."

"Could the two of you perhaps take a brief stretch in the woods?" Edward asked, confusing the entire room. At least, I was confused until I saw the outcome. Jasper would be feel so much better if he spent time with Carlisle on his own. The emotional climate would be perfect.

"I'm willing," Carlisle agreed, inclining his head in deference towards Jasper.

Considering it for only a brief period, Jasper nodded. "Fine by me."

Wordlessly, my father and my husband left the house and headed immediately to the woods surrounding it, thankfully running in a comfortably close proximity to each other. Jasper was already beginning to feel the calm and serene emotions sink in from Carlisle.

Returning from my vision, I was stunned to find the others had all gone. I almost checked to see where and why, but Edward's voice held me back.

"They've gone out to the cottage for a little while," he explained, eyes gently settled on my stiff form just five feet away. After too long of an emotional strain and the loaded silence between us, Edward slowly stretched forth his arms to me, offering the one safe haven I needed to break down in.

And break down I did, with a sudden grip around his middle, painful sobbing, heaving breaths, and fright that was equal to that of my poor brother not long before. From the first minute I had noticed Edward's slight irritation months earlier, until the last unhappy word he had spoken in Carlisle's office, I let out every ounce of worry and frustration and terror I had felt for him.

Wrapped in his comforting embrace, knowing he was strong and whole again, I considered how terrifying it had been to watch my beloved brother sink into such unstable torment with no confidence in himself at all. The slow breakdown was just as painful to remember as his abrupt horror this very day.

"It's all right now, gypsy," he murmured into my cropped hair, a smile in his voice as he used the one name no one but Jasper knew about. It had been Edward's sweet, brotherly way of teasing me over my ability and, despite the fact he hadn't intended to use it more than once, it became my favorite nickname.

"I was so scared," I confessed in a quick, strained whisper, squeezing him tighter. "You've never been so unlike yourself before… I kept telling myself that if you were strong enough to hold me up with Jasper through my terrors after the Volturi left, then nothing was wrong with you. Even though all my instincts said something different."

"You didn't know or understand what was troubling me," he whispered empathetically. "I'm not sure I was capable of telling _myself_ what was wrong."

No more words came to us after that. We simply embraced each other for a long while, releasing the last of the horrible, pent up emotions that had built in each of us for months on end. In some ways, this was the first time we had begun to feel so completely at peace and in sync since I had first seen Bella entering our lives. We had often stood at odds as Bella made her path in life.

Now we stood together. Edward and Alice. The cheat and the gypsy. Brother and sister. Cullens, always.

* * *

A/N: I've never done Alice's point of view like this, so it was an experience. :)

Please review!


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